Polestar will trial StoreDot’s ~350kW DC-capable battery on Polestar 5 prototype
Polestar will trial StoreDot’s “extreme fast charging” technology on its upcoming Polestar 5, enabling the addition of 100 miles of range in 5 minutes of charging.
We’re at Polestar Day in Santa Monica today, where the company is showcasing its future plans to media, investors and owners. For more news from the day, check out our Polestar Day News Hub.
Polestar is an investor in StoreDot, and today at Polestar Day, it has announced that it will demo StoreDot’s 100in5 battery technology in its Polestar 5, formerly known as the Precept concept, a sleek 4-door GT electric car.
StoreDot, an Israel-based company, has demonstrated battery and charging technology that it dubs “100in5,” due to its ability to add 100 miles of range in 5 minutes of charging. It also calls this “XFC” technology, short for “Extreme Fast Charging.”
It’s a clever marketing effort, aiming to make it easier for the public to understand just how fast EVs can charge when using the highest-speed chargers in the best conditions.
But for us in the EV world, it might better to translate that into the kW numbers we all know and love. Polestar and StoreDot don’t have an actual kW number, but we can come up with an estimate based on average consumption numbers.
Doing some rough math on average EV consumption (~300Wh/mi), 100 miles would mean about 30kWh of energy, which means a charge rate of around 360kW if you can get that amount of juice in 5 minutes. Round it down to 350kW since we’ve seen that number before and we’ll call it a day.
Currently, Polestar vehicles can mostly charge in the 200-250kW range, which is pretty quick. Most EVs coming out these days can charge somewhere in the 150-180kW range (with some slower ones out there, like our much-loved Chevy Bolt still at 50kW), and the better performers are in the 200s or even into the 300s.
But 350kW on the car end of things only works if the network also supports speeds that fast. Currently, Tesla’s superchargers cap out at 250kW, but the upcoming V4 superchargers will be capable of 350kW, and Electrify America has “hyper-fast” 350kW chargers in many locations.
Even at current charge rates of 250kW and below, the best electric cars available today are already fantastic for roadtrips – assuming they’re paired with a well-functioning fast charging network. On that front, Polestar did recently commit to joining the NACS standard, opening up access to Tesla’s Supercharger network.
350kW would be about the fastest-charging car available if it was out today, but Polestar 5 will only trial this technology for now, and it won’t be in production in a few years.
Just a few days ago, Polestar announced that it will use Korean battery supplier SK On for production-spec Polestar 5 batteries when the vehicle starts production in 2025, and we don’t know what charge rates that car will be capable of. It plans to bring the StoreDot XFC batteries into production-spec Polestar 5s in 2027.
At that point, though, StoreDot says its future “100in3” solid state batteries will almost be available (that translates to around 600kW, for reference). Those are supposed to hit production in 2028 – so it’s perhaps a little strange that Polestar would start using the 100in5 models in 2027, 3 years after they’re supposed to become available, and 1 year before the better model shows up.
That said, solid state batteries have been “just around the corner” for longer than I’ve been following EVs (and that’s a long time), so we wouldn’t be surprised to see that timeline get pushed back a little.
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Southern California truck spotters will have plenty of electric semi trucks to watch out for as Amazon adds fifty Class 8 EVs to its commercial fleet.
The fully electric Volvo semi trucks purchased will haul both heavy cargo containers and customer package loads in Amazon’s first- and middle-mile operations in California. The trucks will join the hundreds of last-mile electric vans from Ford and Rivian that are already delivering packages across the golden state.
These are the first-ever electric trucks in the company’s ocean freight operations, also known as drayage operations. They’ve already started hitting the road at the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, with a dozen expected to be in service by the end of the year.
“We’re proud to launch our largest fleet of electric heavy-duty vehicles yet in California,” said Udit Madan, vice president of Worldwide Amazon Operations. “Heavy-duty trucking is a particularly difficult area to decarbonize, which makes us all the more excited to have these vehicles on the road today. We’ll use what we learn from deploying these vehicles as we continue to identify and invest in solutions to reduce emissions in our transportation network, and to impact sustainability in the trucking industry more broadly.”
Amazon picks Volvo VNR Electric semi
Amazon’s electric semi of choice this time is the Volvo VNR Electric. These class 8 trucks have a range of up to 275 miles with a gross combined vehicle weight rating (GVWR) of 82,000 pounds. The heavy-duty Volvo trucks ship with a number of safety features that will be familiar to Volvo Car owners, including active collision mitigation, blind-spot detection, lane departure warning, lane keeping assist, and adaptive cruise control.
Altogether, the Volvo VNRs Amazon just added to its fleet are projected to travel more than 1 million miles each year with zero harmful carbon and diesel particulate emissions coming out of their exhaust pipes.
Electrek’s Take
On the one hand, Amazon is making a big deal out of buying electric drayage trucks – which isn’t really big a deal in 2024, since that’s a legal requirement at this point. You literally can’t buy a new, internal combustion drayage truck in California as of this year.
That said, I’m a “celebrate every positive change” kind of guy, and the people who live and work around Amazon’s operations will be literally and figuratively breathing easier with these trucks in operation. As such, I’m willing to give California Governor Gavin Newsom a victory lap.
“California continues to lead the way in setting world-leading climate goals. No other state has created the kind of environment where Amazon and other businesses can lead on sustainability and take major steps forward like deploying this fleet of electric trucks,” said Gavin, in a statement. “California’s climate action continues powering our economy and creating jobs.”
SOURCE | IMAGES: Amazon.
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Thanks to the $10,000 Polestar Clean Vehicle Incentive introduced last week, 2024 Polestar 2 lease prices are now over $120 a month cheaper.
CarsDirect reports that through May 31, the 2024 Polestar 2 Long Range Dual Motor can be leased for $299 for 27 months with $3,299 due at signing.
The auto research portal says that’s a $50 drop in the monthly payment with $2,050 less required at signing. As a result, the effective cost fell $126, from $547 per month to $421 before taxes & fees.
The Polestar 2 Dual Motor – list price $55,300 – is a much better deal to lease than the Single Motor model – list price $49,900 – because amazingly, they have the same lease price. That’s basically a free upgrade to the Dual Motor model.
The Polestar 2 first made its debut in 2019 as the automaker’s first fully electric car. It launched in mid-2020 and the milestone 150,000th car rolled off the assembly line in August 2023.
The Polestar 2 is expected to be phased out in 2027, and company says the Polestar 7 will succeed it.
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